


if you love him

by irreparable



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Introspection, angst if you squint, avengers puppy pile, clint just loves his family ok, listen i love them, sometimes you just need a found family fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-19
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2020-03-07 16:58:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18877360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irreparable/pseuds/irreparable
Summary: "Nestled between a woman of fire and a man of metal, his sharp eyes flutter underneath his eyelids as they find restful dreams."or:Clint can't sleep.





	if you love him

**Author's Note:**

  * For [conspicuously](https://archiveofourown.org/users/conspicuously/gifts).



> Thanks to my best friend for writing the tags and helping me with the summary because she is an EXPERT and I love and appreciate her so much.

Clint relishes being home, he does. Or at least he wants to, and so he does – with all his heart. His family … the way they smile and the way they talk and how he always finds a way to fit back into them somehow. (After being apart, again.) The abundance of fresh air and the warm sun on the grass. When clouds come, they’re just clouds. It’s just rain. 

Laura does an amazing job of keeping it all together. She holds a difficult thing in balance. The thing is, he never forgets to give her credit, when he’s wandering around the place after being gone. Trying to take it all in. He recognizes it, but is powerless against it. (It’s been getting worse.)

She defends this life that belongs to him, shared only with her and the kids. It’s a haven, it’s a protected place. He releases a breath caught in his lungs. It doesn’t belong to his work or to anyone else. (It’s a needed reminder.) It’s all his.

 

It was not a planned thing, to bring the team back there last year. He simply didn’t allow himself to wonder how he might feel about it afterwards. They needed a safe house, a place to regroup. It was a tactical option. Confident he was not bringing any danger back home, he called ahead and told Laura to expect them. (In that moment, she was only her name.)

Clint shakes his head at the ground, thinking back to it. How odd it would’ve been, only a few weeks before that, to imagine. The famed Captain America chopping wood out on his lawn, gently returning a baseball to Cooper and being roped into a game. The illustrious Tony Stark making an awkward first impression – caught off guard and pleased after making Nate laugh – and then immersing himself in tractor mechanics and grease. The mild-mannered but formidable Bruce Banner, setting up shop in the office just off the living room, then sitting across from Lila eating grilled cheese in the kitchen. Remembering the guest bedrooms, for a short while, weren’t in fact empty. Now those things are a part of the place’s past, its character.

Of course, Natasha had visited before. When she came, much less often than the kids would’ve liked, he was glad to have her there. She and Laura were fast friends; Laura treated her as if she was always a part of their lives, and she fell in pace. That was one of her remarkable traits, to find footing in any sort of surroundings. He knew her well enough to know that by all accounts when she was there, the part of her she might at times deem selfish, was happy. And it was profound to see.

Clint kicks a larger piece of gravel down the road and walks along the fence, lost in thought. The cost of familiarity, it isn’t high at all. Though in such times where he must pay it, he envies Nat’s effortless ability – a fish to water, regardless of whether it was water or not. He doesn’t regret it at all, bringing his teammates there was a natural choice. (Ah, his nature.)  
  
So he can’t seem to regret it now. (Though he should probably want to.) 

 

The small chopper is set on the edge of the tree line, placed for some cover – though unassuming by simplicity of its size. If he were just what he seems to be, a family man living out in the country, it might be a hobby – enjoying the freedom of flying, sharing the view with his loved ones. Instead, when it is there, he stands a tad too stiffly by the hatch door, as his kids inevitably pester Stark with questions. 

They point and ask about every button, every lever and switch and screen in the interior, every visible component on the exterior. To his credit, Tony shows a level of patience Clint would’ve thought him incapable of. The responses start out gruff, but he gets always gets enthralled in explaining the tech to young, curious minds – even if it is for the hundredth time. He gets excited explaining the fundamentals of aerodynamics to Lila, or pointing out a new update to Cooper. (He even saw him take Nate into his arms and point out the cockpit, and the rotor, and try to emulate the sound of it with his mouth.) Tony is somewhat of a big kid himself, Clint has learned.

He remembers offhandedly inquiring about it, and how Tony brushed it off – saying it wasn’t a big deal, given that his kids have no pretense or ego, only being curious. He remembers laughing at the irony, when Tony mentioned ego.

Natasha and Laura will watch them as they talk, out of his earshot. He thinks Natasha enjoys talking to another woman, one a close friend of many years now, after coming back from a long mission where they’ve all gotten on her nerves. His eyebrows twitch involuntarily when he thinks of how the team would run without her. It’s difficult thing to do. It’s not a platitude when it’s regarding his team, to acknowledge they are each invaluable parts of a whole. If he’s to be brazenly honest, they’re a bit of a haphazard mess. Considering the extent of competence, they still seem to run on fumes far too often. Still, out of all the teams he’s ever worked with, their results speak for themselves. They work together, and deal with each other, in a learned rhythm. Nat – she grounds the team, grounds him, like nothing else.

Where Steve is righteous to the point of reckless, reactive and ready to take every matter into his own hands; Tony is in his head too much, second guessing and compulsively outstripping himself; Bruce is apprehensive in conscience, fixated on the consequences of a misstep or failure; and Clint consistently loses himself in the job – Natasha is the counterbalance. She keeps perspective. She is present in each moment, adaptable and keenly aware of all options. In the field, especially under fire, she is decisive. Setbacks to her are just another problem to be solved. Natasha is intentional, holding true to their purpose and her conviction – she is a compass.

Steve and Bruce would be in the midst of the action as well. Or, if any were feeling particularly exhausted or pensive, they would say their hello’s and make sure to express their gratitude to Laura for allowing them to stay (Clint knows his wife laughs about this later on, as it occurs every time while she again assures them it’s no trouble at all – they’re in some sense family, after all), before retiring to a free bedroom or take a walk into the distance. They’re all the standard of courteousness one might expect from the heroes on their best behavior. It’s nice to have some extra help, some company, out there on the farm.

 

Yesterday, only two of his teammates arrived in the chopper. Stark and Romanoff returning from a minor mission that employed some of their choice skills. Clint remembers the mention of gathering intel, breaking into some computer system and doing surveillance. The others are currently back in their own lives, at home until they’re called in again. Rogers training new recruits back at the base; Banner dissecting a new stubborn strain of disease that has broken out throughout Southeast Asia.

Clint misses them, when they’re gone. Not exactly in the way he misses his family when gone on missions though, yet not less – just differently.

 

In the quiet hours of the night, when it’s so late it’s become past early, Clint’s eyes shoot open. He doesn’t sleep well anymore, and Laura knows it. Still he pretends to have fallen asleep beside her, so the insomnia – either caused by anxiousness, or simple refusal – isn’t contagious. She gently hums, accompanied by clockwork breaths, safely asleep. He quietly swings his legs out of bed, and puts his feet – padded with calluses under grey socks – onto the cool floor.

Clint walks around in the dark hallways to the kitchen, resolvedly absent minded as he makes a cup of tea. He drinks the good chamomile they have, when it is to accompany the nights like this at home. The bag is left in as he drinks it, and it becomes bitter in its strength. He lets it wash over his tongue idly.

Wandering about the house, as a half-present ghost, seems to serve his restlessness. He finds his way back to the bedrooms, and thinks to check the others are sleeping. He encounters Nat’s first, and through the ajar door Clint can see she’s resting, at least. She’s calm and curled on the side of the bed furthest from the door. Intention to listen at Tony’s door completely abandoned, as if it was what he had planned all along, he tiptoes to the bed and lies down on his back beside her. A wave of relief passes over him.

Incapable of any sort of analytical thinking – damn, he didn’t realize just how exhausted he was until right this moment – he is vaguely aware of a pair of footsteps at the door. They waver on the threshold, and there’s a soft chuckle. Ah, Tony. As quietly as he can, though without the stealth of either of the covert agents in the room, he approaches Clint’s other side and settles himself on the bed – comfortably askew.

A slight smile crosses Clint’s sleeping form, and between two of the most dangerous people in the world, he feels safe. Secure. Laying in-between his teammates, he finally slips into sleep. (He hasn’t slept this well in ages.)

(Nestled between a woman of fire and a man of metal, his sharp eyes flutter underneath his eyelids as they find restful dreams.)

 

Laura awakes to a dawn softened by a layer of pale clouds, giving a rainy tinge to the air, seen by the view of their window. She loves this sort of rain, it releases the smell of tender green buds – every plant smells like its own delightful variant on mint. It was a blessing to live in the country; hard work, of course, but it was also a gift.

The bed is half-empty and this is far from unusual. She throws a shawl over her shoulders and leaves with the notion of finding her husband – who is likely preoccupied with some activity to keep his hands busy – well before anyone is up. Laura leaves and turns to head downstairs, but hears unfamiliar, muffled snoring that makes her turn her head.

Laura knows Clint struggles to fall asleep – body too full of tension and mind restless – and when he does, it’s fitfully. Sometimes she awakes to find him in a cold sweat, breathing ragged from a nightmare; when she does, she holds his hand and strokes his arm and whispers reassurances until he quiets or wakes up. If he wakes up, he folds her in his arms; if not, she folds him in hers – either way, she reminds him that she supports him, in whatever he needs to do, but he needs to do the same, allowing her to take care of him. (If he’s awake, he starts crying at this.) She loves him, she is so proud of him; and so she is pledged to herself. Admittedly, these divulgences tend to be more honest when she’s sure he’s asleep. Those nights she tells him about how it scares her, when all she can do is hold his hand when she wants to hold him close and protect him from everything that’s threatening him – that’s making him afraid. (When she does much more than that, it only gets worse, and he starts screaming in his sleep.)

In Natasha’s room, it’s still fairly dark save the weak morning light filtering in through the closed blinds – and a faint blue casting an indiscernible pattern on the ceiling. Standing in the doorway, Laura smiles sadly, relieved to see her husband sleeping so soundly. His relaxed face highlights graven lines of stress, and the dark purple smudges under his eyes that look almost like bruises – his peace serves to reflect how long it’s been since he’s had it. He shifts in his sleep – settled; content – as if he’d simply collapsed and found somewhere he never wanted to leave.

The faint blue light is coming from the arc reactor, lit up in Tony’s chest and bleeding through his thin dark-green t-shirt. He looks like he’s been knocked out cold. His arm is stretched out across Clint’s pillow, head lolled to the side and snoring brashly – she is nearly surprised at how the other two can sleep right next to him. Tony looks younger when he sleeps, she decides. The hollows in his face are more pronounced (she makes a note to see he eats properly) and his eyes lose their guarded, snarky quality. His jaw isn’t set as it sometimes is. (She doesn’t know that happens when he’s silently trying to breathe in spite of the feeling of a close noose around his throat.) Laura wonders where he goes, what he does, when he’s not on mission or crashing at their house. Where home is for him. (Actually.)

Natasha, on the far side, is the only one even partially under blankets. It looks like she’s kicked most of them off. She’s on her side facing the door, and she too, still fast asleep with a mild expression. One of the most obscure people to get to know, yet no match for Clint’s intuition, nor hers. Laura could at once see the vigilance and reservation she held tightly, the autonomous mentality; the respect and trust she had for her husband, an authentic nature portrayed in nervousness despite herself. A young woman who was not used to having attachments she cared about, or that were concerned with her. Natasha is talented, in ways she didn’t even know about before her capture. Laura is grateful every day for her husband’s heart, the kind who would take a chance on a dangerous Soviet spy, the kind that is the strength of their family. (The kind that is the strength of this family.)

She makes no mistake, she knows.

Laura leaves the door open just a crack, and leaves them sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! Feedback is always welcome ~


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